Battle of Isandlwana

The Battle of Isandlwana was fought on 22 January 1879 during the Anglo-Zulu War. A British force of 1,837 British Army and native troops under Lord Chelmsford was overwhelmed and massacred by a much larger Zulu army in a humiliating defeat for the British Empire; it was later avenged with the victory at the Battle of Rorke's Drift.

Background
In January 1879, the British High Commissioner in South Africa, Henry Bartle Frere, provoked a war with the Zulu Kingdom without the knowledge of the British Parliament back in London, taking advantage of a border clash to issue an impossible ultimatum to the Zulus, demanding that they immediately disband their army. When Cetshwayo refused, the British general Lord Chelmsford led 4,000 troops into Zululand. Chelmsford established camps at Rorke's Drift and Isandlwana, but he took 2,500 of his men to pursue Zulu scouts, leaving just 1,837 British and native troops behind at Isandlwana.

Battle
The 15,000-strong Zulu army under Ntshingwayo Khoza encircled the British force under Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Pulleine, which arranged itself into firing lines. The British, outnumbered, attempted to initiate a fighting retreat, but the withdrawal of some British units threatened the flanks of other British units. While the British morale remained high due to their repulse of several Zulu attacks, their right flank soon became enveloped by the Zulus, who marched in their typical horn formation. The British, equipped with rifle and bayonet, were better armed than the Zulu, who mostly used the stabbing spear and club, but the Zulu's sheer numbers forced the British to condense their positions until they were quite literally fighting back-to-back with bayonet and rifle butt after they expended the entirety of their ammunition. Over 1,300 of the 1,837 British and native troops were killed, including all of those on the forward firing line. The British defeat at Isandlwana is remembered as one of the worst defeats in British military history, but, that same day, the British forces in South Africa made history with their unlikely victory at the Battle of Rorke's Drift.